We fine folks at Unwholesome Foods are fortunate enough to live only a short bike-ride away from Union Square, Somerville, the birthplace of Marshmallow Fluff. This year was the sixth annual Fluff Festival, and we brought home one of the trophies from the cooking contest. Our recipe for Cheese Fluffs won Most Creative.

It looked like steep competition for a while, with foods like Fluffalo Wings also on the contest table. But in the end, our unique twist on rice krispy treats made with Cheetos won the day.

Recipe:

The first step is to chop up cheese puffs into small chunks. Our recipe called for 5 cups worth, but it only filled about 9″x9″ of baking pan. Put the cheese puff chunks in a large mixing bowl after chopping.

The next step is to melt 4 tablespoons of butter in a saucepan over low heat. Then add 1 jar (7.5 oz) of marshmallow fluff, stirring continuously until blended.

Remove the Fluff mixture from the heat and pour it over the cheese puffs in the mixing bowl a little at a time, stirring constantly to coat the puffs evenly. Then press the resulting treats into a parchment lined pan.

That’s it! Beth tried some straight out of the mixing bowl, and they were great. Then she left them on the counter overnight. The next morning, she had other people taste them. They were horrible!

It was a humid, rainy night, and the Cheese Fluffs had absorbed a lot of moisture from the air. They’d become leathery and altogether unpleasant. And the Fluff Festival was soon! We didn’t want to try drying them in the oven since it might melt or toast the fluff coating. Beth threw the soggy fluffs in the fridge, hoping that they would dry out eventually, then dashed off to make a new batch for the contest. In 40 minutes she biked to the store, bought more fluff, biked home, and made a second batch. The fresh Cheese Fluffs got much better reviews. We quickly packaged up the Cheese Fluffs in several layers of parchment and plastic to keep them dry, and Kristen sped off to enter them in the Festival.

Reviews:

Alex – The fresh ones are better than the leathery ones, but I don’t really like marshmallow.

Cheryl – These are good! The Fluff balances out the bad part of Cheetos – mainly the orange stuff all over your fingers. I could see eating a lot of these. We should make them at our next party.

Kristen – I don’t normally like Cheetos and I like these. I guess all along Cheetos were missing marshmallow fluff.

Beth – Mmm, a divine fusion of two exquisite foods. *eats lots* *also eats the first batch over the next several days as they dry out. discovers that eating too many Cheese Fluffs at once can cause lightheadedness, loss of concentration, headache, nausea, hyperfocus, fatigue, and feelings of giddiness*

Next post: Our other entry to the Fluff Festival cooking contest. (The one that didn’t win.)